Bikepacking at the Cusp

"If such a pack is too costly compared to the Golite Jam you got for 40 dollars on gear swap…"

Here, in a single clause, you've captured my entire outdoor procurement philosophy, so I guess I know what my gateway bike would be.

Spot on about keyboard adventurers being in love with the idea of an activity. It's an easy trap to fall into, actually.

* for the record: my Jam was $69 new during a Golite sale online. But I'm still a miser.

Hear hear!!! on steel MTBs from the 90s.

I just gave away my favorite Nishiki to a student…presenting another opportunity to find a new, cool beater bike. Now I just picked up a Trek 850 (Mountain Track XC) and have fallen in love. It was given to me and I've invested $15 in it. Last night I rode the same singletrack inhabited by $6000 bicycles and I only have a front brake right now.

There's something highly appealing to me about bringing a bike back to life that was wasting away in the corner of someone's yard. I've long been a fan of the beater bike, the workhorse of the average Joe. The bikes you see cooks and custodians riding to work and leaving locked to poles and gas meters behind restaurants and offices. The bikes you see on buses and trains, on bike racks on college campuses. Many of these bikes actually get ridden more than the $1000+ machines displayed in bike shop windows.

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate a nice bike. I've got a Dura-Ace/Ultegra road bike…But it's sort of too nice to actually do anything practical with. It collects dust and I should really sell it. My days of lycra are long over…

And I actually like the new Trek better. There's something beautiful about not being too invested in a bike, about not geeking out over minutia. It a bike for riding, not obsessing. I lock it and leave it without worry at the trailhead while I'm out running or in front of the grocery store. I don't have to baby it. With proper tuning and mechanic's skills, it runs as good as anything else I've ridden.

For 99% of what 99% of people do, any bike would be fine. In fact, the inexpensive rigid steel MTB of the 90s is probably the best choice.

Over the past few years I've come to appreciate this and see bikes for what they are as opposed to an opportunity to obsess over the next upgrade or purchase.

"…People locked away in office jobs (without which internet culture would not exist) are prone to fall more in love with the idea of the activity rather than the activity itself." – David C.

"Thinking and planning for my next adventure does sometimes consume more time than the actual adventure." – Sam H.

I'm not so sure about these statements …

David's original comment seems to rely heavily on a stereotype and I think is more about his personal aggressions being directed at the popular commercialization of a previously niche past-time where the barriers to entry have always been low and a result primarily of its obscurity … at least I hope this is the case because otherwise such comments border on elitism.

As to Sam's follow up comment, I honestly believe there is no reason planning and logistics shouldn't take a considerable amount of time for an actual adventure. The planning aspect of an American thru-hike or thru-ride is almost harder than the actual hiking (at least on the PCT and GDMBR), and is just as rewarding albeit in a different way. This is thanks in large part to the disparaged "internet culture" of which this forum is ironically a substantive part.

All my singletrack has been on a late 90's Cannondale rigid, tricked with mostly Deore componenets. My poor one inch headset needs replacing pretty badly, but it's still my favorite bike. I have a Cannondale touring bike with a head shock for commuting and touring/camping, but after these last couple of years exploring backpacking more, a little offroad camping would be fun.

Maybe a good use for the old chromoly full suspension, coil-over-oil Pro-flex I used to bomb logging roads with, that I really don't ride anymore. I leave the carbon fiber for the road, with a Domane 4.5.

I really want a fat bike, but I hate the cold too much, so I know I'd never ride it to its potential. I suppose offroad "touring" would be better on a 29er, but I sure like my 26 for technical, especially climbs, but perhaps that's the topic for another thread.

…and I still don't know Judy.

> My days of lycra are long over…
Defeatist!!!

Cheers

"It's more that exhaustive research about gear, sitting online talking about gear, and buying gear can easily become a replacement for getting out and using gear. It's a theme Dave's touched on many times. Not just for bikes."

Point taken … with the caveat that the irony of an online gear reviewer eschewing the act of researching gear online kinda muddies the waters a tad. LOL. Maybe I'm being obtuse.

I do instinctually take a defensive position when I see any argument propped on "us" vs. "them" terms, particularly when the "them" leans toward a cartoonish characterization meant to evoke antipathy … but if David's larger theme is not to divide but rather encourage more people to engage an activity rather than just contemplate an activity … then I get it. Gear will not take you for a hike; you need to take your gear.

My Karate monkey has made me curse while climbing uphill and cheer while flying downhill for a few years now.

Did I exploit a stereotype to make a point? Of course, though a few words in the section titles should have helped everyone put that in proper context.

The notion that anyone who writes about gear in a vaguely professional way should rubber-stamp the ways in which contemporary consumerist culture and outdoor recreation directly contradict each other (insofar as the former is easily linked to the continued degradation of wild places) in one I utterly reject. I do hope that publications and individuals who have been responsible for promulgating this will eventually come to loose sleep over it, and will continue to prod them towards doing so.

Bikepacking is a fantastic example, which is why this article got written. I think bikepacking has the potential to be more widely practiced than backpacking, in that it can be (physically) lower impact and makes larger distances accessible. I'd like to see that. I'm not going to sit silently while companies use it as a marginal reason to sell folks a bunch of stuff they probably don't need.